Sew-sew

By Aneesah, 29 Aug 10

Hello again! Thanks very much for your kind words regarding the new domain and stuff. This post is a short-ish one (I’m practising, ok?) about a few crafty things I’ve been making… and then some. I’ll start by mentioning this new Facebook “fan” Page I made a few days ago, as a place to keep track of the arts- and crafts-things I’ve made over the years. Previously, it has all been at Flickr, but I’m not a Pro member there (which means the total number of photos in my gallery is limited — and yes I’ve had to delete photos before ), and not many people I know have an account or browse Flickr regularly. I’m hoping that having a gallery on Facebook will make my works more reachable to non-crafty folks and general acquaintances.

I’ll mostly be posting photos of new handmade things there, and share crafty links or tutorials, etc. etc. I think what would also be cool is if people who own anything made in Aneesah’s Hideaway (ie. made by me ) share their pics as fan photos. Two-way communication is good, yes?

I haven’t been very crafty during the holidays because… well, I’d like to blame work, but it’s just the general busy-ness and staying in a temporary room with half my stuff still in sealed boxes and working on less glamourous tasks like altering clothes. Mainly shortening jean legs and adjusting their waistbands. I have gotten into a habit of purchasing kids’ size jeans when they are on sale (I’m talking age 13-14 here, and a price range of about £7 – £12. I have always envied children’s clothing and footwear, but sadly my feet are quite average-sized for a 21-year-old), but even then the leg lengths sometimes still require adjusting. Also they tend to suit a child’s body (…well, duh? ) and usually the waist needs to be taken in a bit, or else I’ll have to wear a belt, which I dislike.

Alterations done to a foot hem and waistband.

People like to say but I don’t know how to ___ when it comes to these DIY things, but really, all you need to do is Google. I confess myself a beginner in sewing garments, so a little online help would point in the right direction. There is a way to shorten trouser legs while retaining the original hem (that means the bit of existing stitching at the end of the leg), which I learned here. I did the waist here in a not-so-discreet way of adding darts (after shortening the waistband), but a neater (and more labourious) way of using the side seams is described here. I don’t mind the visible darts on mine because I usually wear longer shirts that hide even the back pockets of my jeans.

Since I’ve had a lot of jeans over these two years, I get to cut them up when I don’t want to (or can’t ) wear them anymore. Denim is a really nice material to make bags and pouches from since it’s sturdy and stiff and naturally pretty. These are a couple that I’ve made lately:

A flat pouch used as a long wallet. I used beads from my mum's old jewelry and felt for the name.

A pencil-case style pouch for a dear friend who likes golfing and tennis. Referred to several tutorials for this one.

Made for another friend who requested one. I did patchwork this time since the fabric scraps were getting smaller.

I have a couple more pouches to do for an order (one is a felt one — I haven’t worked in 100% felt in awhile ) so hopefully I’ll be un-lazy enough for those. See, I do make things for people who ask for them (and accept payment if they generously offer ), but I can never have a deadline or set a time frame because I just don’t work that way. It becomes too uni-like or work-like and then I just don’t want to do it.

What came in the mail (surprisingly quickly) from my home country

Elephant by beadbreath, tulip and kitty by me

In other news, I was the recipient of a very cute elephant necklace made from melty beads (also known as pixellettes, hama beads, perler beads, and maybe several other terms). This was from beadbreath’s giveaway (another crafty Malaysian, w00t! ). I’ve dabbled in this craft before, but have never seen pieces done like beadbreath’s. It’s double-sided, and jointed, upping the cute factor. And so I made a tulip and kitty cat, trying her technique. I hope you don’t mind, beadbreath, I don’t sell these things anyway. They are a fun simple activity for friends to do if they venture into my room. (I swear my friends are older than 12. Hey, who says adults can’t play anymore?)

The kitty has two joints, and I couldn’t resist making it do a little jig:

Go kitty, go kitty~

I’ve posted the keychain to a dear friend of mine, I hope she’s looking out for mail back home.

It looks awesome in here! When you post, you can post to your FB fan page. Just go find the application RSS Graffiti and you can put your RSS feed in… when you publish a post, it will automatically post there too (or whenever you set the application to pick up new posts.)

I tried those a long time ago… I feel old now…lol. Right now I am doing paper beads and fimo clay beads when I have time. It is true, a lot of what you can learn in DIY can be found online.

I think I bought a few packs of sculpey clay for a model ages ago but never got around to trying it out. Polymer clay has always been one of those cool things I could never find back home. The perler beads have just come into trend there, too.

Assalamu’alaikum Aiza, inshaAllah, feel free to e-mail me (click the about page above) he details of what you’d like. I have to say I won’t be able to do tight deadlines at the moment, but if you don’t mind waiting, then I don’t mind taking up your order iA.

sure can. no problem.:)i dun mind with the deadlines.
i love more to sporty design. & i hope u can make it a bit bigger..:) bout the budget, i dun mind.:) just let me know the cost including the postage..:) ok.?